


Your Guide Must Be

by Katherine



Series: Hakuna Matata Quartet [2]
Category: The Lion King (1994)
Genre: Canon Divergence, Diverges from canon, Gen, Hakuna Matata, Homesickness, Nala and Simba both in the jungle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2020-05-13 22:59:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19260892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katherine/pseuds/Katherine
Summary: Simba did a lot of lounging around in the jungle, and said again and again "Forget the past". Nala couldn't.





	Your Guide Must Be

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by an official [shirt that has cub Simba and Nala both with Timon and Pumbaa](https://www.shopdisney.com/the-lion-king-ringer-t-shirt-for-girls-1503197).
> 
> Title from Warthog Rhapsody.

Simba did a lot of lounging around in the jungle, and said again and again "Forget the past". Nala couldn't.

"It's been kind of fun, like a vacation. That thing Zazu never takes." Nala's giggle at the memory of Zazu's self-important complaints that he could never take time off was joined by Simba's. "But I want to go home," Nala said, serious. Even if it was weird to be something like a family with two of the prey species her mother had already started to teach her about hunting. "I do like Timon and Pumbaa. But I miss my mom."

"I miss mine," Simba admitted, low. "But my dad... and Uncle Scar was scary." He had never quite said that _he_ was scared. Nala had watched as Simba tried to believe wholeheartedly in their caretakers' "problem-free philosophy". But Nala knew. She had herself been frightened, and she had not seen Scar. Only the dust from the stampede, and the dust in the desert as she followed Simba's tracks. Her growls had kept the buzzards circling a little further away, Pumbaa told her. Those carrion birds would have flapped down closer to a single exhausted lion cub.

"Simba, c'mon, we have to go home." When Simba shook his head again, vigorously, probably imagining the mane he was nowhere near growing, Nala tried out, "Maybe I want to be queen already."

She didn't, really, but would pretend she did, if that got Simba thinking about the kingdom they'd left behind. Anything that lead out of the jungle and back to where they should finish growing up.

*

"We'll miss you, kids," Timon said. As if to cover up his emotion, he added, "For singing... A duet's nothing like a quartet."

"You got to put your behind in the jungle," Pumbaa said, almost wisely. When Timon elbowed him, Pumbaa corrected himself. "The jungle behind you. We'll go along with you a ways, help chase the buzzards off."

It would be a long desert trek, predators though they were. But this time Nala and Simba would be running not away from their home but back to it. Back to the Pride Lands, and back to their pride.


End file.
